


Aftermath

by esaaalbitas



Category: Final Fantasy Tactics
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-07
Updated: 2010-07-07
Packaged: 2017-10-10 10:37:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 939
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/98822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/esaaalbitas/pseuds/esaaalbitas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There was closure that needed to be felt.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Aftermath

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place not too long after their conversation (and fight with Zalmour) in Zeltennia's church.

He woke.

The room had no light and was unrecognizable, but it only took a moment for him to regain his bearings. He was still in Zeltennia, after Ramza confronted him in the church. It is evening now, crossing rapidly into night.

And the journey his hand made across the bed told him thus: the man next to him was his companion. His hand traced the outline of the other, softly, as if not to disturb him.

He remembered their passion, his roughness. A mix of pain and lust. The quick in his flesh and the surrender of the body beneath him as he became lost-

His breath caught.

Delita hurried out of their bed, quietly as possible. He felt broken, the guilt of using Ramza mercilessly almost tearing him apart. He fumbled in darkness.

As he pulled the undershirt over his body there was a clatter. He felt, rather than saw, cool eyes watch him. Then a red light flared and splashed against the walls, a dim candle was held in Ramza's hand, wax soon threatening to drip along his fingers and onto the covers.

"You'd soon leave me like this?"

"I only go for a drink." (White lie?)

"Answer me in truth."

Delita met his eye. "What do you suspect?"

Ramza tossed off the covers with his free hand and stood. The candle was a cheap one, and in his movements wax had dribbled onto his body: bright white upon his thigh.

"Yea, you'd leave me to my dreams, only hours after knowing you, once more..."

Nude, Ramza stood before him. In a mere thin wave of cloth Delita felt a stark contrast of their bodies; it made him uncomfortable. He cast his eyes downward with a rough murmur, unheeded: "Don't stand before me like this."

"...And I've dreamt of you, and'll continue dreaming: It was as we were, so long ago. Before your scars, before you donned that holy knight's cape. When I could still touch you. When I could..."

Letting that sentence drop, Ramza kissed him.

Delita let him.

A drop of wax fell between them.

"Return to me. Say I'm a sinner in need of prayer..."

"Aren't you a heretic?" (Wry, a ghost of Delita's humor, dark.)

"No," Ramza amended, "merely a sinner, like you. Is there really that big a difference?"

And the candle gave out, enveloping their hearts and bodies in darkness. Blinded, Delita saw only ink: felt only fingertips graze his skin, hot lips meeting his own. Wax peeled off the hand to become lost on his shirt.

"You misread me. I have not prayed since-"

"Use me for your gambits, as your assassin or your whore. But don't leave me like this." (Not a ghost, a pleading, Ramza's want and need.) "Let me remember you, let me know you again."

"Ramza, I--"

"Let me find you. Earlier, that wasn't you."

At first there was despair, a denial, I am what you see now, there is nothing left to find. But there was the embrace he found himself in, a face buried into his neck, kissing gently, whispering.

"Could you forgive me for wanting you, still? And could you forgive yourself, for giving in?"

He found himself melting. He never thought such an odd choice of word would ever apply to him. The horrible, guilty feelings were melting away, leaving someone more vulnerable. Someone capable of making a promise (Ovelia, I will keep it), someone more than able to be a companion, battle mate, brother, lover (Ramza, I'm not able to keep you)...

"Show me." Surrender.

Delita came undone; the blond's kisses moved on to his lips to lead him back to the bed. That evening he was almost greedy, taking as much pleasure and inflicting as much pain as he could before he burst. But now Ramza forced him into restraint, making him feel every touch. He guided Delita's hands over his body, wordlessly revealing his vulnerabilities.

Each became aware of the their scars, and those stories which kept them on different paths for so long. One hand escaped Ramza's lead to stray at the nape of his neck, where his ponytail used to be. Delita missed losing his fingers in that long hair. And what did he use to cut it so much shorter than his own?

But he himself hasn't changed much, if you assumed he always donned a somber expression. And the blemishes: numb remnants of a fire that never stopped at the blood, never extinguished within. They decorated his torso, always hidden by armor and cloth. Ramza's fingers caressed and lingered even there, remembering that Delita was still a man.

It was Ramza that took him this time, bruised lips catching his lover's in time with his thrusts, moaning his forgiveness. The yearning body beneath him arched toward his own, Delita's desire entangled between them.

"I want to tell you," Ramza breathed, "that I love you. If you confess me to the church to justify your means, if I am exiled from the world where you rule as king, I'd still love you. You can still be loved, even for all the wrong you've done and may well do."

They came together, Delita crying out his name. In their aftermath he clung to Ramza, breath and heart slowing.

***

Their ways parted the next morning, not knowing that they'd never see each other again- and never despairing when their paths stayed divergent. Both felt that their last night together would suffice on this side of the world; it was closure.

They had their own fates to follow, they reasoned, even if one did not include the other.


End file.
